


Water Death

by blackkat



Series: Tumblr Drabbles [64]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Blindness, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Shisui is not a happy bunny, Shisui lives, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-14
Updated: 2017-10-14
Packaged: 2019-01-17 05:07:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12358107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: He wakes blind and battered and aching right down to his bones, so much so that he can’t pick out where one pain starts and another ends.





	Water Death

It's almost impossible for the body to allow itself to drown. The mouth stays closed, what little air there is trapped and greedily held until the brain is just about to shut down, until all the eyes can see is darkness and only then—

One last breath, one final gasp of denial, and everything ends.

Shisui has watched people drown before. He’s ANBU—it’s a convenient way to get rid of bodies, or at least delay them being found. He’s seen the desperate struggle not to breathe, the fury and terror and then the inevitable surrender. It was one of the reasons he picked the method of death he did; drowning was hardly peaceful, was a fight against an unbeatable enemy, but Shisui has always had a bit of a dramatic streak to him. He’d liked the metaphor of it, the symbolism, and it simultaneously managed to be eminently practical. Even Itachi couldn’t complain.

He’d felt it. He knows the Nakano was the death of him, knows it as well as he knows his own name—another irony, another bit of an inside joke carefully concealed from Itachi, whose sense of humor is underdeveloped at best and who has never, ever appreciated Shisui’s gallows humor, no matter the circumstances. He jumped, and fell, and hit the water, and then the bitter current swept him under, pulled him in and—

One last breath, held until his mind is spinning and his entire chest is burning and then—

His head breaks the surface.

 

He wakes blind and battered and aching right down to his bones, so much so that he can’t pick out where one pain starts and another ends. There’s water all around him, beneath him, cradling and carrying him, but it isn’t the headlong heedless rush of the Nakano in early spring. This river is smoother, shallower. His feet scrape over a sandy, silty riverbed, and though he can’t see the bank to judge his speed, it definitely seems slower than what he last remembers, that final glimpse he sneaked before he gouged out his own eye for his best friend.

Automatically, he lashes out, seeking something—anything—to grab ahold of, to brace himself with, but comes up with naught. His hands splash futilely through the water, skimming nothing, and Shisui wants to curse. He’s been a shinobi all his life, has worked with more handicaps than this in worse situations, but between the pain and the blindness and the echoing quiet that’s all he can hear beyond the river’s flow, this isn’t looking hopeful.

Shisui takes a breath, chokes on a mouthful of muddy water as a wavelet slaps him in the face, and then fights himself back under control and focuses on his surroundings as best he can. The flow of the river is easy enough to judge, and Shisui kicks out, swimming crosswise to it for what he hopes is the bank with all of his quickly fading strength. There’s no echo around him to suggest a ravine or a canyon, no birdsong or wind-rustled leaf noises to hint at a rocky forest riverbank, and Shisui can only hope that the shore isn’t completely sheer or covered in treacherous loose rock.

But his fingers close on grass, long and sodden and slippery, and then dig into firm clay. Shisui gasps and scrabbles for purchase and breath in equal measure, tries with all his might to drag himself out of the insistent current, and for an endless, breathless moment he thinks he won’t, that he’s going to be pulled away to who knows where. One more wavelet knocks him under, and he comes up sputtering and choking on the taste of river-weed and mud, half of his brain shrieking about infection and diseases and open wounds, god, his  _eyes_ —

A tree root, thick and trailing, and Shisui grabs it, winds his arm around it and hauls himself forward, towards where the current slides away into nothing more than a gentle tug at his sodden clothes. Another foot further and there’s solid ground beneath his feet, slick and sliding and apparently more silt than clay, but it’s enough. Shisui staggers, off balance and unable to care just for the moment, almost falling as his upper body finally clears the water. He’s  _heavy_ , the all-over throb changing to something sharper, angrier as he pushes himself forward, hands reaching blindly. Grass beneath his hands again, but dry this time, the tips bone-brittle and breaking as he seizes fistfuls of it and uses it to pull himself the last few feet out of the water.

There is no thought in him for dignity—not that there ever is, because that’s Itachi’s shtick and Shisui has always been quite happy to be the slightly goofy, easily distracted one of their clique—or even the possible danger of his surroundings. Shisui sucks in his first dry breath, smelling sun-browned grasses and warm summer air, and lets himself fall face-first onto the bank, his feet still dangling in the water and his hands gripping the grass blades without any intention of letting go.

A breath, another. Shisui thinks of drowning, thinks of opening his mouth for that final inhalation of cold, cruel water, and can’t fight the shudder of pure, icy horror that racks his body.

One breath, the sun warm-hot on his face and the river tugging greedily at his toes, and Shisui lets out a long, slow sigh and allows himself to drift.

The darkness, when it comes, is finally, blissfully warm.

 

Because Shisui’s life has never even remotely resembled a romance novel—except, perhaps, for the dramatic failed suicide attempt in the name of the greater good, but Shisui is trying his best not to think of that—there is no beautiful, kindhearted maiden or brave, strapping hero leaning over him when he comes to. There’s only the cheerful babble of the river as it swirls past his toes, the whisper of wind across short grass and the bone-meltingly sweet heat of the sun against his skin.

And pain, still, from where his eyes were ripped out, from where his body hit the water and was slammed into rocks beneath the treacherous surface, from a fight that never should have happened with a man who should have been an ally. But if nothing else, Shisui is used to pain. His tolerance for it has always been higher than normal, even for a shinobi, and so he pushes it down, shuts it away and focuses on his surroundings instead.

He isn’t in Konoha; that much is immediately apparent. There’s a certain sharp tang to the air that speaks of the sea, even though he can’t hear it, and the sunlight falls unimpeded by Konoha’s towering trees. It’s hardly dead—there are birds around, filling the air with sudden cries and startling bursts of wingbeats as they rise, but they’re grassland birds, swift starlings and light-voiced larks. Shisui knows their cries and calls, but only vaguely, not enough to positively identify where he is from that alone.

Nowhere near Konoha, he’s certain. Nowhere near the Nakano that should have borne him to his watery grave.

But Shisui is a shinobi, has been for over a decade, and he doesn’t waste time with disbelief or directionless worrying about how he got where he is. Instead, he pulls himself to his feet, toeing off his waterlogged sandals as he staggers upright, and listens.

Birdsong and water rushing and a whisper of wind among the grasses. No people. No chakra either, from what he can sense—muted, impossibly weak, those senses, when he’s so used to the Sharingan, to being able to pick out every nuance and spark from half a league away.

(Being blind, he thinks, is quite possibly one of the worst fates an Uchiha could suffer. No matter what power the Mangekyo grants, surely it isn’t worth it.)

The susurration of the grasses breaks briefly to his left, then starts up again a few meters on. Shisui listens carefully, head tilted slightly to hear more clearly. A road, he thinks. Too wide to be a path, and it can’t be a dry riverbed when the river runs to his right. He steps towards it, careful and deliberate, bare feet feeling out the space before they settle. Three short, hesitant steps and the grass gives way to packed earth, rutted and worn almost smooth with small patches of stone peeking through here and there. Shisui doesn’t quite allow himself to sigh in relief, but the thought is certainly there.

Fire Country—Konoha—lies west of the ocean. There are border patrols along the north and northwest borders, and couriers constantly moving to and from the west. If Shisui can figure out the directions and make his way there, he’ll likely be found soon, if he keeps his chakra visible and doesn’t try to hide.

But—

But the reasons for his attempted suicide haven’t been negated by his miraculous (ridiculous) survival. The Uchiha can’t know of Danzo’s actions. They can’t know that Itachi is a double agent, and that Shisui was as well. Shisui can’t take that risk. There’s an entire clan at stake, if he goes back and not enough time has passed. Families and children and Konoha’s fragile peace, and Shisui won’t be the one responsible for upsetting that. Even if Itachi—

Shisui takes a shuddering breath, picks the direction he thinks is east, and starts walking.

It’s hard. The first few steps feel like drowning all over again, his toes scraping the sandy bottom of a river unable to get a grip. Like grasping for a hold and feeling it slip like sodden-slick grass between his fingers. Like one last breath of air that isn’t enough and can’t last. There’s nothing around to steady him, to orient him. Only darkness and a clawing, tearing sort of desperation. Shisui stumbles the way he hasn’t in years, more than a full decade, but his reflexes are enough to catch him even without eyes, and he steadies. One step, another, one foot in front of the other until he’s caught the rhythm of it. His body doesn’t need to see—he’s trained in the darkness a thousand times before, has made himself go without sight because he’s well aware of the Uchiha clan’s almost crippling reliance on their eyes.

But it’s still a shock, suddenly finding himself without. He hadn’t expected to survive his leap into the Nakano—had planned to the contrary, even. One last play to protect Konoha, even if no one besides Itachi ever knows. Because Shisui isn’t a hero, and never has been. He’s an assassin, a killer, has murdered dozens of people and fought in a war and gone on some of ANBU’s darkest missions. But he’s done it all for the good of his village, and that’s what matters. That’s the only thing that counts, in the end.

Danzo… Shisui might not respect the man himself, but he can admire his willingness, his lack of hesitation to dirty his hands in the name of protecting Konoha. Even though Danzo stole his eye, tore it from him and betrayed him, he’s sure that Danzo thought he was doing the best thing for the village. Danzo has never trusted the Uchiha, and apparently with good reason, going by recent events. He has his own beliefs, and he acted on them in the name of keeping Konoha strong.

Shisui won’t aid him, maybe, but he won’t hinder him either.

And he won’t let something as small as a lack of sight stop him from moving forward, now that he’s somehow survived.


End file.
